Archive for December, 2011

Stanczyk, put together a couple of pieces to make a NEW and useful Polish Genealogy database. First off, my email box had a weekly email from Ancestry.com. This week’s Weekly Discovery is a boon for Polish Genealogists …

Ok, the above link takes you to Ancestry’s newest database index (http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=70048&enc=1) . Which as the Link Name suggests is a Polish Catholic Parish Marriage Index. I was excited until I discovered that it was really just a re-issue of the PGSA.org ‘s database: http://www.pgsa.org/CzuchMarAll.php . So if you are not a subscriber to Ancestry, you could just go to PGSA and use their database and get the same results. The PGSA even gives an LDS Microfilm #. So Stanczyk took note of an Anna Eliasz marrying Leon Zielinski in 1910 and the LDS MF#: 1578072 . I made a vow to look that record up in the LDS microfilm. So I was in the LDS Library Catalog verifying the microfilm # was correct and LO and BEHOLD (why is it always LO and BEHOLD — and not just BEHOLD), the Library Catalog says the images are online!!! They even provided a link:

Now thankfully the database did specify 1910 and that the church was St. Stanislaus Kostka and even the Page# 204 was helpful. I used those pieces of info and the Family Search link to go to their web page:

From there, I picked Marriages, 1910-1915 (you need a free login to use their databases) and browsed the images until I got to page# 204 (which was actually image # 109 of 897) and on the left hand page was Leon Zielinski & at the bottom Anna Eliasz marriage record from the church. I got the actual date and parent names (including mother’s maiden name). See below …

I am not certain that Anna Eliasz is a relative or not because it did not provide the parish where Anna was born (and I seriously doubt Anna was born in Chicago in 1882). Her mother’s maiden gives me hope as that name does appear in my ancestral villages, so now I will have to find an Anna Eliasz birth record (or not) in Biechow/Pacanow parishes with parents Jan Eliasz & Mary Jurek.

The point of today’s article is that by joining the index in PGSA.org (or Ancestry.com) and using the index data with the browseable images from FamilySearch.org I was able to pull a new Church Parish record quite easily without leaving my house. It is the combination of the two resources from two separate websites that make a new and very useful tool. What do you think?

If you have Chicago ancestors (and in particular Polish ones) then you have an early Christmas or Chanukah Present. Drop me a comment of thanks, will ya?

Merry Christmas & Happy Chanukah and just in case, Happy Holidays to the rest of my readers.

Stanczyk has a lot of catch-up to do. I blame it on the season and the Blood Red Lunar Eclipse — certainly that must be cause of the madness this December.

SSDI

So many blogs have written about the Social Security Death Master File and the many related issues. First millions of records were dropped by the SSA. Next the SSA, and this has probably been going on for months, started redacting the names of the parents on the SS5 Applications, thus eliminating the usefulness of that research tool. Now Congress has bullied the paid genealogy databases (and even Rootsweb) to drop the SS# from their databases on deaths in the last ten years. Rootsweb just dropped their Social Security Database altogether!

Now let me remind the lame (not lame duck) Congress that the Social Security Death Master File is used to inform banks/financials/loan companies/credit card companies etc. that these SS#’s are of the DECEASED and that they should not grant any NEW credit applications with the Social Security Numbers in the Social Security Death Master File! Ergo, having the SS# of a dead person should not avail any criminal and should in fact result in their arrest for fraud, as the afore mentioned companies are supposed to check the Social Security Death Master File against credit apps. Therefore, there is really is no need to eliminate the SS#’s from Ancestry.com or any other database. By eliminating these numbers you cannot order the SS5 Applications — which is just as well since the SSA has made them much less useful. The result is: genealogists have less data available and the US Government has less MONEY($) available since the genealogists now have two reasons not to order the SS5 Applications any longer. The result is the US Government will now lose another source of income??? Boy, is this CONGRESS the biggest bunch of idiots or what?

Eastmans / Website Rankings

Dick Eastman’s Online Newsletter recently wrote about new website rankings and gave the URL/Link to a Anglo/Celtic website. Needless to say this is the website that caused this jester to produce a BETTER set of website rankings (please see my page above or at Genealogy Website Rankings). I ask you to please utilize my Genealogy Rankings as they are based upon resources in more common use in the USA (and Canada), such as SteveMorse.org or EllisIsland.org or CastleGarden.org or any Polish-related website or blog. So I am compelled — not because I am as popular as EOGN.com (#12), vs Stanczyk (#120). But clearly leaving off the Steve Morse, or Ellis Island or the US NARA or Fold3 is not accurate in the USA and certainly NOT in the GLOBAL Genealogy market as a whole. Now this is foremost a blog about Slavic Genealogy (Russian-Poland overtly emphasized) and so I have made an effort to seek out and reflect Polish websites of Polish Genealogy websites/blogs (when their popularity reflects the need). I have intentionally not included GENPOL.com because its Global Ranking is too low. It is a very well known website to Polish Genealogists and I am sure in Poland itself it would be in the top 125 (just not Globally). So while this blog has a certain voice, my website rankings deserve as much attention as those that Dick Eastman writes about. Perhaps one day EOGN.com will notice this blog and its Genealogy Website Rankings List — you my faithful readers can help me by emailing Dick Eastman and informing him about my set of Genealogy Website Rankings which is very thorough and includes the Top 125 Genealogy Websites — including Polish & American & Jewish (re NonAnglo-Celtic) websites too. EOGN should not be allowed to perpetuate its blind-spot to other genealogies. Now let me hasten to add the other Rankings does in fact mostly agree with my own Rankings on the top 10 or 20 Genealogy Websites — his Rankings lack Polish/American/Jewish sites and my own Rankings miss a few Anglo websites and all of Ancestry.com’s other country sites (UK, CA, DE, AU, etc.) — which should probably be aggregated into Ancestry.com but due to their many domains their totals are segregated by Alexa (ratings agency) and this jester chose not to include so many Ancestry.com properties in the Rankings (which would exclude so many other worthy websites).

As before, let me remind new genealogists that this Genealogy Website Ranking could be utilized to create or augment your genealogy Bookmarks/Favorites. Obviously, they are valuable since a LOT of genealogists visit them.

MOCAVO

I forgot to mention about Mocavo.com (I put it into the newest Genealogy Website Rankings). I have briefly mentioned Mocavo.com before (when I found them in my blog analytics). They are a new search engine, akin to Google. However, they are a Genealogy Search Engine and as such is enhanced to understand GEDCOM, genealogy, dates, places, etc. and their search results are more intensely accurate then say what you would get from Google. They also have the ability search databases and include those in results, as well as GEDCOMs. You have the ability to submit your family tree (GEDCOM) to Mocavo and they can provide you with notices of potential new matches — much like Ancestry.com does for their subscribers. So instead of Googling you Family Tree, try MOCAVOing your Family Tree.

Eye of Newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg, and howlet’s wing,–
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

—Macbeth, the 2nd Witch

Stanczyk has been a big fan of the Bard for a lonnnnng time! It seems like eons. He was big into jesters and for that I applaud Shakespeare.

His works always seem prescient and applicable to the times at hand. I believe Shakespeare is second to the Bible in terms of being quoted. Has anyone applied the “psuedo-science” of Gematria to Shakespeare? I know about the “Bible Code” and I am pretty sure that mathematicians have used Moby Dick to find predictions in these texts in some kind of Nostradamus-like process of divination. But has any text been more lucid or evident upon the page without any mathematical calculation at all? I daresay not.

Let me hasten to post this article before the GOP flavor of the month disappears like so much Häagen-Dazs black walnut.

Today is the 70th Anniversary of the day Pearl Harbor was Sneak Attacked by the Japanese — that caused the USA to officially enter into World War II.

Most of the Greatest Generation of Americans would be 83 years old or older — my own father is now 85 (center, front Navy man). It is just him and my uncle Ted (back, left Army man) who remain alive now.

How fortunate for my Busia, that her four sons returned to her (in Detroit) alive. My uncle Joe (2nd from left in back Army) was stationed in Hawaii after Pearl Harbor was attacked. My uncle Steve (left-most, front Navy man) joined Joe there in Hawaii briefly for a war time reunion / shore leave.

From 1941 to 1945, receiving a telegram was something to dread. My grand-aunt, Antonina (Toledo) awaited her four sons too. God Bless my family, but eight men returned from the war safely to resume their lives. Alas, for Antonina and her ailing heart, receiving a telegram about one her sons was too much for her sickly heart and though her sons survived the war, she did not survive that telegram bringing news from the war.

In my wife’s family her uncle Milton, a 2nd Lt. in the Army is buried at Arlington National Cemetery (he had survived WWII too). Her own father had finished his service to country in the Philadelphia Naval Shipyards — just two weeks. He died from that service. He contracted mesothelioma (asbestos poisoning) from his final two weeks — but was fortunate enough to raise a family before succumbing 42 years later to this hidden War-time scourge.

Detroit was the Arsenal of Democracy, shifting from cars to tanks/planes. Many people do not realize that population shift that war caused. A Huge migration from the South swelled the population of Detroit as workers were required to keep the factories running 24x7x365. I still remember eating Southern “cuisine” in diners in the greater Detroit area decades after the war.

Back East, the Shipyards were busy building the warships with their armaments. The USS Dixie (AD-14), Tender Destroyer that my own father served on was built right here in Philadelphia (launched on 27 May 1939) — probably in that Navy Ship Yard. A far cry from that 1913 September day that my grandmother arrived in Philadelphia. How funny for a Midwestern boy, that Philadelphia would be where my grandmother arrived, where my father’s WWII ship was made and where I would wind up living and raising a family with my Philly girl.

Before, I started genealogy 15-16 years ago, I did not know my grandmother arrived in Phillly (we thought Ellis Island like my grandfather and so many others). I did not know that ship my father served on was built here. I had not even moved to Philly yet. Destiny draws you to these places and then you discover that the history of your family preceded you. Full circle.

Remember the Day of Infamy (70 years ago) ! Remember 9/11/2001 too, now ten years ago. Family History Marches on.

You should immediately quit the BCS. It is rigged against you and your three conferences. If you read my letter then you should see from my analysis, that the “computer polls” are inherently biased (and perhaps worse than the two human polls that make up the other 2/3 of the BCS rankings).

First off, I used the Human Polls (Harris Poll & USA Today/ESPN) as the normative index. If you say this ok then you can accept my analysis. If you reject it, then you should be pitting LSU against Oklahoma State in the BCS Championship Bowl Game, because that is what the Computer Polls would have made the result if there were no human polls as a part of the BCS Index.

My analysis clearly shows that the computer polls OVERWHELMINGLY favor the BIG12 and have a strong bias in favor of the SEC too. At the same time it is OVERWHELMINGLY rigged against the BIG 10 and strongly biased against the ACC and the PAC 12 conferences.

The analysis shows that the Big 10, ACC and the PAC 12 would have to overcome a huge bias by the computer polls via the Human Polls to have any chance to reach the BCS Championship Game. You should realize that by selecting the SEC every year to play in the BCS Championship Game, you keep the bias in the computer polls and it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy each and every year. That means the BIG Money will continue to flow unchecked into the SEC (and also to lesser degree to the BIG 12) as it is a “virtuous cycle” upwards for these two conferences who get the best recruits and booster money because they are ALWAYS in the BCS Championship Game.

Now that you have given in to the precedent of two teams from the same conference in the BCS Championship Game (should be a rule against this) you will see a heavy bias to that year after year, since that is all new recruits will see and the “virtuous cycle” will persist. Also, did you realize that the computer and the human polls will emphasize the next year’s polls based upon the previous year, via the pre-season polls?

The root cause you will see is that two computer polls in particular: Kenneth Massey & Jeff Sagarin strongly overemphasize Big 12 teams and SEC teams also have a strong positive bias, while at the same time, these two same computer polls also demonstrate an under-emphasis of the Big 10 and a strong negative bias against the ACC and PAC 12. The effect is what we have seen for the last few years and culminating in this years SEC-only Championship.

If you want to keep the BCS Polls, then you will need to do five things to improve them and their perception as fair:

Make a rule that the BCS Championship can NEVER have two teams from the same conference. This should be self evident.

Make the remaining computer polls submit their algorithms to an audit before the season starts and a week before/after the final BCS rankings \to ensure that these computer algorithms are “bias free” from human intervention and that the same results are achieved in the before/after of the final rankings (i.e no tampering and results are reproducible i.e. no randomness).

You must get rid of one or both of Kenneth Massey of Jeff Sagarin computer polls. The dual combination skews the biases in favor of BIG12/SEC and against the BIG10/ACC/PAC12. If you only get rid of one, then the initial removal should be Jeff Sagarin. The two computer polls show the same bias and are merely echoes of each other thus giving them an undue advantage over the other four computer polls. The Jeff Sagarin poll is merely MORE pronounced (in its biases) than the Kenneth Massey poll.

No 4 loss or 5 loss TEAM can ever be eligible for a BCS Bowl Game. You need this rule to prevent obvious bias from contaminating the system.

No 2 loss TEAM can play in the BCS Championship Bowl Game (substitute the next highest ranked team that does not violate rules 1 & 5).

Mind you the Anderson & Hester computer poll exhibits some bias too, but it at least it is not in COMPLETE lock step with the Kenneth Massey or Jeff Sagarin polls. Otherwise, please dismantle the BCS system and just have 4 super football conferences and take the conference champion from each and have these four teams play a semi-final and a final game to determine the national champion fairly. See the attached spreadsheet data, cut/pasted into the next page and do you your own analysis to validate my findings and see if you reach the same conclusion. Please pay special attention to TEXAS in the final rankings if you wish to be totally disgusted by the computer polls – there is no mathematics that can justify that conclusion by computers, unless there is a BIG12 bias. The computer polls would have made TEXAS, a 7-5 team, the 19th ranked team overall in the whole country and the two offending computer polls would have made TEXAS 13th in the country and eligible for a BCS at Large Bowl Game. Can you imagine? Only TEXAS and AUBURN (BIG12 & SEC) have 5 losses in the BCS Top 25. In fact there are no other 5 loss or any 4 loss teams!

Someone should commend the Richard Billingsley, Colley Matrix and Peter Wolfe computer polls for their ability to keep bias from skewing their rankings.

Anderson & Hester can and should do better in their computer algorithm.

2011

FINAL

BCS

POLL

Human Polls

A/H

RB

CM

KM

JS

PW

Comp Polls

Comp Diff

Diff Summ

LSU

SEC

1

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

BAMA

SEC

2

-1

-1

-1

-1

0

0

3

-1

-4

OKLA St

B12

3

1

1

1

1

0

0

2

1

4

Stanford

P12

4

0

0

-1

-4

-6

-3

5

-1

-14

Oregon

P12

5

-7

0

-3

-5

-4

-1

8

-3

-20

Arkansas

SEC

6

-1

-2

-6

1

2

2

5

1

-4

Boise St

MWC

7

-2

1

0

-6

-6

-1

9

-2

-14

Kans. St

B12

8

3

1

4

4

3

3

4

4

18

SCaro

SEC

9

-1

1

-2

0

1

0

10

-1

-1

Wisc

B10

10

-5

0

-5

-6

-9

-2

14

4

-27

VaTech

ACC

11

-2

0

-2

-3

-10

-6

13

2

-23

Baylor

B12

12

1

2

-5

2

6

5

11

-1

11

UMich

B10

13

2

-3

4

-6

-9

-5

15

2

-17

OKLA

B12

14

8

5

8

7

8

4

7

-7

40

Clemson

ACC

15

-4

0

-3

-5

-2

2

16

1

-12

Georgia

SEC

16

2

-4

0

5

5

2

12

-4

10

Mich St.

B10

17

-3

4

-4

-7

-7

-5

21

4

-22

TCU

MWC

18

-4

4

-1

-5

0

3

17

-1

-3

Houston

CUSA

19

3

0

5

-2

-6

0

18

-1

0

Nebraska

B10

20

3

2

3

-5

-3

0

19

-1

0

So. Miss

CUSA

21

25

-1

-1

25

25

5

24

3

78

Penn St.

B10

22

1

1

2

25

25

-1

23

1

53

West VA

Beast

23

25

25

-1

25

25

25

25

2

124

Texas

B12

24

7

25

2

11

11

0

19

-5

56

Auburn

SEC

25

0

1

25

8

11

4

21

-4

49

-7

11

-8

-35

-37

-2

-17

-78

Skew By

Conference

ACC

-6

0

-5

-8

-12

-4

-35

B10

-2

4

0

-24

-28

-13

-63

B12

20

7

10

25

28

12

102

Beast

na

na

-1

na

na

na

-1

CUSA

3

-1

4

-2

-6

5

3

MWC

-6

5

-1

-11

-6

2

-17

PAC12

-7

0

-4

-9

-10

-4

-34

SEC

-1

-5

-9

13

19

8

25

Source: 12/5/2011 Philadelphia Inquirer Final BCS Standings

The bottom five teams were unranked in one or more computer polls making their data unfit for some of the analyses – these were not used in the bottom analysis of Skew By Conference.

Well on the Facebook page for the Polish Genealogical Society (in Poland) [written in Polish] was a mention of an update of the Parish Church Books website. It appears that our Polish breathren were very industrious in November and there were a great many updates.

For Example

on 28th-November-2011:

woj. świętokrzyskie

Działoszyce

chrzty, małżeństwa, zgony

Geneteka

Gierczyce

chrzty

Geneteka

Jędrzejów

małżeństwa

Geneteka

on 23rd-November-2011:

woj. świętokrzyskie

Bogoria

chrzty

Geneteka

Jedrzejów

małżeństwa

Geneteka

on 14th-November-2011:

woj. świętokrzyskie

Bogoria

chrzty, małżeństwa, zgony

Geneteka

Grzymałków

chrzty, małżeństwa, zgony

Geneteka

Koprzywnica

chrzty

Geneteka

Obiechów

chrzty, małżeństwa

Geneteka

Pińczów

małżeństwa

Geneteka

Tumlin

chrzty, małżeństwa, zgony

Geneteka

And those were just the last half of November and just for the Wojewodztwo (woj.) Świętokrzyskie (formed from the old former woj. Kieleckie) where Stanczyk’s ancestors were from. Just about all woj. are represented as having changes, so it is worth a look no matter which partition(Russian, Austrian, Prussian) of occupied Poland you have ancestors in.

Please see the bottom of Stanczyk’s former article for a listing of what each database abbreviation means and where it is found.

It is good if your heritage includes the Germanic peoples or locales which were previously under their dominion. Do not get me wrong. I am thrilled that there now over a million Polish records/images online or indexed at FamilySearch.org.

Country

Records

Percentage

Austria

196,940

0.37

Czech Republic

85,469

0.16

Germany

50,998,675

96.98

Hungary

Browsable Images Only

0.00

Poland

1,002,155

1.91

Russia

303,146

0.58

Slovakia

Browsable Images Only

0.00

Ukraine

14,143

0.03

TOTALS:

52,586,385

We have the ability to better. Please consider volunteering as an indexer. You can start and stop and start again, your volunteering at any time. Find out more at indexing.familysearch.org. Every little bit helps. Stanczyk managed to do over 150 records this year. Genealogy is collaborative. Helping each other, we also help ourselves. Please pitch in — make this part of your Random Act of Genealogical Kindness efforts.

From The News.PL, a couple of days ago, they wrote about historians that uncovered a previously unknown memoir by one of the victims of a notorious WW II Nazi operation against Polish intelligentsia (called Sonderaktion Krakauof November 1939).

One of the principals, Zygmunt Starachowicz, kept a memoir of the experience with:

Interesting Profiles of the detainees

How he was a law graduate signing documents at Jagiellonian University when he was arrested with 182 academics

How 20 of the 183 people died in captivity

A memoir penned in 1941, that lay in unopened envelope for 70 years

Sadly, Zygmunt died in 1944 after being arrested by the Nazis in July 1944 [probably as a result of his activities as a member of the underground, leading clandestine lectures in law and history, and forging documents for the official “Home Army” (AK)].